(MAR 21) Lausanne, Switzerland: The International Boxing Association (AIBA) has launched a new Diversity in Boxing program for all of its 203 National Federations. The new program will be the first in a range of initiatives to be presented in the coming months following the AIBA Extraordinary Congress earlier this year.

Financed by an AIBA sponsor, the Diversity in Boxing program will make a 1 million Swiss Francs available each year for AIBA’s National Federations’ uses in various projects via the AIBA Confederations. For the first year, to secure an effective take-off, this support will be further increased to 1.2 million Swiss Francs.

Starting from April, all National Boxing Federations can apply for funding by submitting the applications to the AIBA Confederation who will review and make the final decisions to accept the applications. The program will mainly support initiatives focused on good governance and organisational ethics program in the National Federations, as well as youth and women’s boxing initiatives. All financial support will be closely monitored by AIBA with full disclosure of all allocations combined with detailed reporting systems.

Gafur Rahimov, AIBA Interim President said:

“At our Extraordinary Congress in January we heard a call for change from basically all of our National Federations – urgent and radical change. My colleagues in the Executive Committee and I have listened carefully and decided to move forward both quickly and forcefully with a focus on areas such as good governance, organisational ethics and diversity.

The Diversity in Boxing program is therefore only the first of a range of initiatives that will be launched over the coming months, and as is the case with the other new programs we will be presenting, it will continue to run for many years.

I am fully aware that AIBA urgently needs to improve on many fronts, and all AIBA National Federations can rest assured that my colleagues and I are fully committed to achieve this improvement, in every aspect of our organization and our sport. We have many things to do and little time to do it, and that’s when leadership must deliver”.

The Confederations plan to distribute the application forms to all National Federations in order for them apply. Certainly, the Confederations will also be available to assist and guide each National Federation to get the maximum benefits out of this new initiative starting from April 2018.